UBS cuts Apple price target to $95 from $100

Analysts for UBS Investment Research on Tuesday cut their price target on shares of Apple Computer to $95 from $100, but maintained a "Buy" rating on the stock.

"We believe that Apple's shares reflect second quarter results slightly below consensus with cautious guidance," analyst Ben Reitzes wrote in a research note to clients. "Weak iPod unit sales [of 9 million units or lower] may be expected."

However, the analyst still believes the company's guidance of $4.3 billion in sales and 38 cents in earnings-per-share (EPS) will turn out to be conservative given strength in its ?other music" sales. "We believe second quarter EPS over 40 cents could be considered a positive given the recent plunge in shares," he wrote.

Citing his own checks, Reitzes estimates sales of 9.6 million iPods last quarter with a Mac unit shipment declining 9 percent year-over-year to 979,000 units. "We believe the 'Other Music' segment was solid with 9 percent revenue growth [since last quarter] helped by accessories and growth in iTunes," he said.

Given seasonality and the the Intel Mac transition, Reitzes, like other analysts, expects Apple to issue conservative guidance for its third (current) fiscal quarter of 2006. He believes this outlook may be conservative given a few new Macs slated for the quarter.

"Based on slightly lower estimates, our target adjusts to $95 from $100, still based on an EV/sales multiple of 3x our 2007 fiscal year estimate, higher than Apple?s 'pre-bubble' multiple and its peers due to faster growth and higher margins," the analyst wrote.

Also on Tuesday, Lehman cut its own price target on Apple to $73 from $80.

Apple is a wild ride, and I actually am very happy with all the attention the stock has gotten because it's fun to speculate on the stock of a company you love.

I actually sold much too early though because I was afraid the stock might not do as well, thereby causing me to mistake my dissapointment for not loving Apple anymore, haha.

I don't feel that way anymore. I think the management at Apple is fantastic and I am glad that I rediscovered Apple two years ago. I really feel as though I know a great deal now about what to expect from Apple, even when to perhaps expect the unexpected.

The dozen or so times I've watched Apple earnings announcements, just every time, the stock immediately afterwards. This is after good news and beating even the most optimistic analyst expectations and significant actual growth and market share increases. So really, if there aren't major commissions to be worried about, I'd sell now and buy after the announcements.

IMO, if your bullish on Apple, why not look at intel? They are now one of Apple's biggest suppliers and are quite cheap based on P/E. If Apple does well well it should rub off on intel. In addition I think that the delay of vista really plays to intel's advantage. When vista is released it will probably spur pc sales, regardless of what we think of vista as an os. By the time that occurs intel shoud have their big guns in their core lineup rtm. I think they will compare nicely to amd's offerings and will sell well. I've been buying intel here under 20. My 2 cents.

IMO, if your bullish on Apple, why not look at intel? They are now one of Apple's biggest suppliers and are quite cheap based on P/E. If Apple does well well it should rub off on intel. In addition I think that the delay of vista really plays to intel's advantage. When vista is released it will probably spur pc sales, regardless of what we think of vista as an os. By the time that occurs intel shoud have their big guns in their core lineup rtm. I think they will compare nicely to amd's offerings and will sell well. I've been buying intel here under 20. My 2 cents.

Depends on who you listen to. Argus has a buy on the stock. Jim Cramer is bullish on the stock, although in all fairness he has been bullish for some time while the stock has tanked. How can you be that optimistic about Apple and not Intel? Apple is a pure intel house just like Dell. Although volume is smaller, Apple is buying Intels higher lines of chips where I'm sure Intel has greater margins. Look, both could go nowhere. Different opinions are what make markets. I doubt many people had buy ratings on Apple at $4.0 but that was the bottom and buyers have been richly rewarded.

Depends on who you listen to. Argus has a buy on the stock. Jim Cramer is bullish on the stock, although in all fairness he has been bullish for some time while the stock has tanked. How can you be that optimistic about Apple and not Intel? Apple is a pure intel house just like Dell. Although volume is smaller, Apple is buying Intels higher lines of chips where I'm sure Intel has greater margins. Look, both could go nowhere. Different opinions are what make markets. I doubt many people had buy ratings on Apple at $4.0 but that was the bottom and buyers have been richly rewarded.

Because, despite Apple's recent lack of new product, Apple is a growth company. Even if their years sales are less that previously thought, from about $20 billion down to the newer estimates of $18 billion, that's still a $4 billion rise ? from $14 billion. A pretty good jump.

Intel's sales have been lackluster. AMD has made big gains, and is likely to continue doing so for the next 9 to 12 months, though after that, it's anyones guess.

Apple's moving to Intel, will drag Apple down this year from what had been expected, but from the stock price now, it has good upside.

The announcement of the Windows enabling software alone has given the stock a good boost.

There is little boost to Intel from Apple, this year. Though if Apple's sales rise dramatically next year, the situation could be different. But, no matter what happens there, Apple will still be a small percentage of Intel's total sales.

At this time, the only chips Intel has that are considered to be better than AMD's are the Core technology chips, as represented by the Yonah's. The rest of Intel's line-up is considered to be creaky, at best.

They have just introduced the last of the Pentium 4 line of chips, which is a last gasp for that, much abused line.

The new chip lines won't be coming out until the third quarter, at the earliest.

That's the Merom, Conroe, and Woodcrest.

Even then, AMD still has some advantage in the Opteron line.

The Conroe seems to be performing very well when compared to the Athlon, but until AMD comes out with their new chips, we won't know just how much of an advantage they will retain, if any.

Intel has pushed the on-die memory controller back at least another 6 to nine months, stating that some of their new tech obviates the need for it. Whether that is true, or they are just having problems integrating it, isn't known yet.

But, Intel responds to poor memory bandwidth with large on-chip caches. That helps, to some extent, but not always.

It's thought that Intel needs until the end of 2007 to catch up, and surpass AMD on all fronts (depending on whether AMD can adequately respond).

Until then, Intel is seen as continuing to lose marketshare to AMD.

This doesn't really affect Apple more than slightly. Possibly for their hi end machines, but that's about it.

At this time, the only chips Intel has that are considered to be better than AMD's are the Core technology chips, as represented by the Yonah's. The rest of Intel's line-up is considered to be creaky, at best.

They have just introduced the last of the Pentium 4 line of chips, which is a last gasp for that, much abused line.

The new chip lines won't be coming out until the third quarter, at the earliest.

That's the Merom, Conroe, and Woodcrest.

Even then, AMD still has some advantage in the Opteron line.

The Conroe seems to be performing very well when compared to the Athlon, but until AMD comes out with their new chips, we won't know just how much of an advantage they will retain, if any.

Intel has pushed the on-die memory controller back at least another 6 to nine months, stating that some of their new tech obviates the need for it. Whether that is true, or they are just having problems integrating it, isn't known yet.

But, Intel responds to poor memory bandwidth with large on-chip caches. That helps, to some extent, but not always.

It's thought that Intel needs until the end of 2007 to catch up, and surpass AMD on all fronts (depending on whether AMD can adequately respond).

Until then, Intel is seen as continuing to lose marketshare to AMD.

This doesn't really affect Apple more than slightly. Possibly for their hi end machines, but that's about it.

I would agree that Intel's netburst chips are inferior to AMDs chips. However I feel based on Anandtech's appraisal of Conroe that Intel will begin to have superior chips. We don't know yet how Woodcrest will compare to opteron but I'm guessing it will be better. We already have good evidence to show that Conroe will beat Athlon easily. On the laptop side it's a laugher, Intel all the way. Again by the time Vista comes to market the Intel chips should already be established and I think that is when Intel will regain market share. The wildcard is what will AMD do to respond. However we know also that Intel will beat AMD to 45nm, so they still have another card to play IMO.

I would agree that Intel's netburst chips are inferior to AMDs chips. However I feel based on Anandtech's appraisal of Conroe that Intel will begin to have superior chips. We don't know yet how Woodcrest will compare to opteron but I'm guessing it will be better. We already have good evidence to show that Conroe will beat Athlon easily. On the laptop side it's a laugher, Intel all the way. Again by the time Vista comes to market the Intel chips should already be established and I think that is when Intel will regain market share. The wildcard is what will AMD do to respond. However we know also that Intel will beat AMD to 45nm, so they still have another card to play IMO.

To a certain extent, that's what I said, in a somewhat more staid manner.

But, again, we are talking about investing now. And these chips won't be here untill sometime 3rd quarter to forth quarter. Major sales won't take off until year end.

And then we still have to see what AMD counters with.

The tests for Conroe were very good, but were not the final say, by any means.

I'm, of course, hoping for the best, but for investment purposes, I would stay away for now.